The Source Of The Shadow
by Lord Kristine
Summary: Claire has a bad day.


Now, don't get lost when I bring up dragons. That's something you don't need to understand fully, though it helps if you do. I'm only mentioning the involvement of mythical creatures to explain how this story came about. See, once upon a time, there was a dragon who, for various reasons, held a grudge against Claire Dearing, and would stop at nothing to make her life miserable for it. I know it sounds crazy, but it's a simple idea despite the unusual circumstance, so just go along with it. It's a true story.

Anyway, this dragon had a document- kind of a record of Claire Dearing's life, let's say- and she was sifting through it to find Claire's weaknesses, specifically relating to her past mistakes. Of course, pretty much everyone was aware that she had inadvertently caused a genocide, among other atrocities. She would always be sensitive about that (naturally), but the dragon was looking for something new to use against her. There's only so many times you can bring up a person's accidental enabling of mass slaughter without sounding like a broken record, after all.

So the dragon was flipping through this document, right, and she found something surprising. The content wasn't surprising in itself, actually, but it involved the dragon's granddaughter, who had never once brought up this event. After reading it, it was obvious why.

Fighting the initial impulse to be sour about her granddaughter concealing this occurrence, the dragon instead focused on the intent behind said deception. She read about what happened after the actual event had unfurled in such a gruesome manner, when Claire Dearing was sobbing in the arms of the dragon's granddaughter, losing all pretense of control.

"Claire, do you realize what could have happened?!"

"I know! You can't tell Owen!"

"What if he found you?"

"Please, don't tell him! Don't tell anyone!"

"I won't, but don't ever do that again. There are people who care about you."

And they went on to discuss the matter for the next hour.

The dragon was mostly concerned with the event itself, which happened sometime before Claire gave birth to her daughter, and after she became a Stegoceratops- again, you don't need to know how or why. That's just the way it happened.

The whole mess began when Claire asked the dragon's granddaughter to help her with a kind of test-run. She was living on a ranch in Tennessee at the time, and had concealed herself from the world, as one does when they become a dinosaur. There was a town nearby, and Claire was dying to interact with other human beings . . . Well, not exactly OTHER human beings, since she wasn't human anymore, but you know what I mean. Although she and Owen were good at pretending they didn't need other people in their lives, the simple fact remains that no human being- or Stegoceratops- can live alone forever. So Claire asked the dragon's granddaughter if she could help her by casting a spell that made it so she could go into town and be seen as she was, but not surprise anyone with her appearance.

Her wish was granted.

It was raining that day, and Claire felt a sense of dread, though it was unclear what effect these two factors had on each other. In any case, she decided to ignore the terrible sensation that twisted all three of her stomachs and walked straight into town with Owen by her side.

As she passed the first few townspeople, Claire's anxiety melted away. They were not surprised by the fact that she was a dinosaur. The spell was working perfectly. And it only got better . . . in the sense that nothing changed. Nobody seemed to care about her at all (in the best possible way). It was like she was completely normal, and she loved it. By noon, she was strutting down the road with confidence, feeling better than she had in months.

She sat with Owen on the patio of a small restaurant, beaming from ear to ear (she still had earholes) and fidgeting with excitement. Between lapping up her lemonade and chewing on salad (and cud, inconspicuously), she marveled at the magic spell with a wagging tail.

"It's working! It's really working! I was so afraid, but now I know it's possible to be accepted!"

Owen smiled cautiously.

"I'm happy for you, Claire, but don't forget that this ends at sundown, and they won't have any memory of this."

"I know, but this is the ideal situation I was hoping for. Tomorrow, I'll come back and explain everything to them, and in time, things will become just like they are today. I'll be a real person again."

"You already are."

He leaned in for a kiss. When they parted, things took a turn for the worse.

That was when the whispering began.

Claire wasn't sure if it was in her imagination, at first, but she turned her head slightly and saw two girls look away swiftly, as though they had been talking about her. Her stomachs began to hum with discomfort.

Later, when Owen brought her to the florist, the lady at the counter informed him that his bouquet was toxic. He told her that the flowers were just for show, not eating. When the woman realized the nature of his relationship with Claire, the corners of her mouth gave a subtle twitch, and Claire felt herself sink into the floor with shame.

And then the rain started for real. The wet pavement and cold, humid air were now justified by the falling droplets, which did not come as a relief, as some truths do. Owen opened his umbrella calmly, and when he held it over Claire, she saw two old men frowning at them from a bench across the street. She tried not to meet their gaze.

As they returned home, Claire continued to hear whispers, even when there was no one around. She shivered in the back of the truck, and looked over her shoulder at the silhouettes of the town's buildings, which were blurred with mist. She then realized that being a Stegoceratops wasn't the problem. The world could very well accept a dinosaur living among people as long as a hybrid was not truly one of them. Unfortunately, that was what Claire wanted. She was not just a dinosaur: she was a dinosaur trying to be human, and that was what really made them uneasy. But regardless of her body's shape, she still had the mind of a human, and could not live like an animal. She was stuck between two worlds.

The more she thought about it, the more she came to grips with the impossibility of her situation. She was in love with Owen. She couldn't help that. But she wasn't allowed to be, because she was no longer the same thing he was.

Not physically.

In her heart and mind, she was as human as ever. She couldn't leave this love behind or live life with the same needs and wants as an animal. She had tasted love, sentience, and above all, humanity. No decision she made would end well, so she decided not to decide.

And that's when she did it.

Of course, it resulted in the aforementioned discussion with the dragon's granddaughter, who remained true to her word and told no one. Still, Claire would never forget what she had almost succeeded in doing, and how lucky she was to be a complete failure. It was almost impressive how consistently she screwed up, and how a good fraction of these screw-ups benefitted her in the long run. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry about it. It was kind of funny how it happened, but she was having trouble seeing the humor in her situation.

There is not a rope in this world that can support the weight of a Stegoceratops.


End file.
